Preschool

Preschool

Age Range:

3 - 4 years

Areas of Learning:

Sign Language

Literacy

Small and Large Motor Skills

Our Classrooms

We work on self-help skills, small and large motor skills, letter and number recognition, communication, and several other cognitive and social skills in our preschool classes. We cover these areas using a variety of methods to ensure that learning is always fun and interesting for your child.

Our curriculum is theme based, meaning every week is centered around a certain theme and everyday we discuss a different topic pertaining to that theme. We will integrate this theme into most every activity during the day.

We also concentrate on one letter of the alphabet every week. We work on recognizing this letter, sounding it out, beginning to write it, and also learning how to sign this letter in sign language.

We try to have a balance of teacher-directed and child-initiated activities throughout the day. We have set times for learning center activities and we also set up writing and math activities for the children. A special art activity is usually set up during learning center time too. The children use the computer room daily and we go outside or do large motor activities in the big room every day.

Star of the Week

Every week, one child in each Preschool classroom is our “Star of the Week”. This child will get to tell everyone about themselves and share some of their favorite things with their friends. You will be notified the week before your child is the star to prepare anything your child would like to share with their classmates.

Child Guidance

We believe that positively guiding child behavior is critical for building and strengthening a child’s self-esteem. A child-centered program allows children to be children, giving them all the experiences they need to become independent and happy individuals. Teachers are there to facilitate by helping and guiding children in a problem-solving environment.

Sometimes, we have to redirect certain behaviors, but it is very rare that we use the typical “time out”. We believe that this type of guidance is not very helpful to the child, since it calls too much negative attention to him or her and children often learn so much more by solving their own problems. That is what preschool is all about. Teachers are here to help the children learn how to deal with their own problems together, not to hurt their self-esteem by making them sit.

Setting clear limits for the children in our class is a very important part of our problem-solving philosophy. Limits, unlike rules are flexible and may be adjusted to fit the individual situation. Setting limits helps children learn for themselves how to change behavior that is unacceptable. This is all based on a trusting relationship between child and teacher. The teacher’s role is most importantly to assure the safety of each child and adult, to prohibit the destruction of materials and equipment, to assure individual acceptance of responsibility for one’s actions, and to assure equal and respectful treatment of all people.

Teachers set limits with children by giving them information and choices, and by using this technique we have had great success and we hope to build strong trusting relationships with all of the children in a warm and caring environment.